Gas turbine engines are used to power aircraft, watercraft, power generators, and the like. Gas turbine engines typically include a compressor, a combustor, and a turbine. The compressor compresses air drawn into the engine and delivers high pressure air to the combustor. In the combustor, fuel is mixed with the high pressure air and is ignited. Products of the combustion reaction in the combustor are directed into the turbine where work is extracted (e.g., by rotating a series of blades of the turbine) to drive the compressor and, in some cases, an output shaft. Byproducts of the combustion are exhausted out of the turbine.
Compressors and turbines typically include alternating stages of static vane assemblies and rotating wheel assemblies. The rotating wheel assemblies include series of disks carrying blades around their outer edges. Thus, as the products of the combustion reaction flow though the turbine, the static vane assembly of a given stage directs the flow of the combustion products toward the blades of the rotating disk assembly for the corresponding stage. The hot gases produce a rotation of the rotating disk assembly. When the rotating disk assemblies rotate, tips of the blades move along blade tracks included in shrouds that are arranged around the rotating wheel assemblies.
During operation, the tips of the blades included in the rotating wheel assemblies typically move inwardly and outwardly relative to a centerline of the engine due to changes in centrifugal force and temperatures experienced by the blades. Because of this movement inwardly and outwardly relative to the centerline, turbine shrouds are often designed to allow clearance between the blade tips and the blade tracks. This clearance, however, can allow combustion products to pass over the blades (e.g., radially outside of a circumference of the rotating wheel assembly) without pushing the blades, thereby contributing to lost performance within the gas turbine engine. Moreover, in some instances, the blade tips contact the blade tracks arranged around the rotating wheel assemblies and cut grooves into the blade tracks further contributing to lost performance within a gas turbine engine.
In an effort to mitigate such losses, a shroud surrounding a rotating disk assembly can be formed from a number of blade track segments, members, and/or subassemblies. In these designs, the blade track segments can be allowed to move independently in a radial direction in response to a radially inward and/or radially outward movement of the rotating wheel assembly. Thus, wear to the blade track resulting from contact with the blade tips can be reduced. While losses due to wear and fatigue of the blade tracks can be reduced by forming the blade track from multiple blade track segments, a leak path may result between adjacent blade track segments, which in turn can lead to losses resulting from a flow of the combustion products through the leak path. Thus, in some known turbine engines, sealing elements can be disposed between adjacent blade track and/or shroud segments. Such known sealing elements are often disposed within complex grooves formed in the matting segments. Thus, accommodating known sealing elements often increases time, labor, and cost of manufacturing and/or assembling a shroud or blade track.
Thus, a need exists for improved sealing members included in turbine shroud assemblies and methods for manufacturing the same.